Perhaps Some Schubert
With Your Chardonnay?

By

Stuart Isacoff

Updated Feb. 16, 2011 12:01 a.m. ET

ENLARGE

Looking to shake things up, 'Late Night Rose' offers chamber music with a glass of wine by candlelight.
Michael Lawrence

New York

Classical music presenters everywhere have lately been shaking up the stodgy status quo. Even the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center, a staunchly traditional organization with a loyal but conservative following, has gotten into the act with "Late Night Rose," a series in which programs regularly offered at 6:30 p.m. in the Society's small Rose Studio are repeated at 9:30 p.m., but with significant new twists: At the late show, an engaging host introduces the musical selections, and patrons are offered a glass of wine and seated at candle-lit tables. (The next event in the series will be on Thursday, then March 10 and May 12.) Cellist David Finckel, co-artistic director of the Society, insists that none of this was a marketing ploy to snare a larger (or younger) audience. Nevertheless, its instant success just might provide an important lesson for those who care about the survival of classical music.

Late Night Rose

The Chamber Music Society Of Lincoln Center

Feb. 17, March 10 and May 12

The concept is actually as old as public performance. The churchlike atmosphere of modern concert halls notwithstanding, Mozart debuted his piano concertos in the 1780s in Vienna's restaurants and guesthouses, where eating, drinking, gambling (and sometimes shouting and brawling) were not so unusual. Today, the informality of the music club (Le) Poisson Rouge in Greenwich Village—which offers classical, jazz, rock and avant-garde shows in equal measure while serving food and drink—has made it one of the most popular venues in New York, representing not only music's distant past but perhaps also its future.

"I'm not ready to go so far as to say our new format represents the future of classical music," insists Mr. Finckel. "Economically, it isn't a model that works for everything. Besides, we already have 27,000 people coming per season to our concerts—and most are happy with the usual configuration. But the idea was intriguing because we have the facilities to combine the best of two scenarios: the casual setting, as well as a first-class piano, good acoustics and silence—without all the waiters and bartenders and other distractions. The new series is simply a different door we've opened, but it's one that still goes to the same place."

The concept took root last year, says Mr. Finckel, when he found himself alone in the Rose Room late one night. "I took all the tables out of the closets and set the entire room up myself," he remembers. "It took me about an hour. I was curious to see how many people we could actually fit in. There was enough room to break the seating up into multiple angles; if you look at historical photographs and paintings—going all the way back to Zimmermann's coffee house, where Bach played—that is how it was always done in small spaces."

Nevertheless, questions remained: would the looser format be attractive to audiences uptown? And, equally intriguing, what effect would it have on the musicians? Curious to find out, I attended two double-evenings at the Chamber Music Society—gauging the musical differences between the early and late sets, and gathering reactions from both performers and audience members. From all outward signs, the changes had a significant impact on both the patrons and the music makers.

In both sets, the level of musicianship was exceedingly high. Yet, from this listener's perspective, the second performances each evening were the winners: The interpretations were more organic, the instrumental textures more clearly defined, and the playing invested with a more buoyant energy. As Mr. Finckel notes, such judgments are highly subjective. And who can say whether the differences were a result of the first run-through preparing the musicians for the second one (in a free-for-all discussion, one of the performers remarked, "It's like a marriage: at first we just moved in together, and then we learned something about the quirks we each have"); or of the changed, more informal atmospherics; or any number of other factors? Yet, in some respects, perception is reality. And several of the artists shared my point of view.

Veteran violist Paul Neubauer likes the late-night format because, "as a performer you get a different vibe from every audience. A more relaxed situation means that we become more relaxed." The situation allows you, agrees oboist Stephen Taylor, "to bring your animal energies out a little more. It's good to have the looseness." There were other advantages, says violist Beth Guterman: "Just sitting on stage without playing, as Patrick Castillo spoke about the music, made me feel a connection to the audience that was somehow more personal. They felt closer. And Patrick set up the magnitude of the pieces in a way that was inspiring." Of course, not everyone shared that perspective: "I'm not sure I felt a difference on stage," says cellist Nicholas Canellakis. "Except for the sheer fact of playing the monumental Schubert Quintet in C—a 55-minute work—twice in one night."

And what of the audience members? They seemed to be slightly younger at the second concerts, which, like earlier ones, were played to a packed house. Those I polled left no doubt as to their exuberance for the setting. "It was worth staying up for," reported Alan Kramer. "I'm changing all my tickets to the later shows."

Mr. Isacoff is on the faculty of the Purchase College Conservatories of Music and Dance (SUNY).

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